Wedding Tour: Viva Las Vegas

There’s an old adage that “what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas,” but it’s up to my lawyer friends to let me know if that clause still holds weight in the internet/blog/reality TV era, so I have no qualms about posting some pictures from Suman and Kristi’s amazing wedding in Las Vegas. Especially when my body is still on Las Vegas time. So, below are a few pictures my good friends Jen and Eric took during our Thanksgiving weekend journey to Las Vegas.

Despite the fact that Vegas is probably my least favorite destination city in the country (thus putting it behind Chicago and LA, but ahead of Fargo, Boise and Omaha, though the latter city is the subject of one of my favorite Counting Crows compositions), I’ve now been to Vegas five times in the past four years (including twice this month). But since all of my earlier journeys have been fueled by either Phish or Vegoose, I’ve never had a real Vegas weekend---or at least the type of Vegas adventure that might end up in a scene from either a Hunter S. Thompson novel or National Lampoon Vacation film. But thanks to my dear friends Suman and Kristi, I found myself digesting my kosher Turkey in the heart of Sin City with some of my closest friends. Since the average age our of our wedding party was 26, the entire weekend also took on a bit of a Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitters Dead feel and was actually both a wedding and a bachelor party rolled into one (I’ll leave it up to you, dear reader, to figure out which images correlate to which event). But I will tell you that the weekend involved a $2,800 bar tab at the 40 Deuces burlesque club (apologizes to my Relix cohorts, looks like I will be eating canned tuna for the foreseeable future), a $400 dollar bottle of vodka (much of which regrettably ended up on the floor during one heartfelt hug), a hooker (who to my friend’s credit he thought was just a friendly girl who spent 2 hours hearing about his lovely girlfriend), a strip club (which offered more levels of VIP access than Vegoose and Bonnaroo combined), a 13 bedding mansion (our Real World approved home which came complete with a pool table, hot tub, poker chips and towels), a party van (which looked like a Hummer, but felt like a DeLorean talking us on a Back to the Future adventure through time to our high school prom days) and a minister that look like neither Elvis or Frank Sinatra. I’m happy to say that I managed to walk away from Vegas with a few hundred dollars in my pockets (most of which I brought with me from New York, but I digress) and no wedding rings on my fingers, giving the weekend a refreshing festival feel. And of course like any festival, the event ended with a friend of mine passed out in the backseat of his car while I navigated my way through 7hrs of traffic back to LA for a much needed vacation from reality (or at least the type of reality you can find on TV between the hours of 8-10 PM each night on your local broadcasting station).

While congratulations are certainly in order for Suman and Kristi (whose wedding itself was amazing), the real winner of the weekend was my good friend Nick, who managed to win well over $500, wave that $500 in the face of a man he called Mikey (though his name tag clearly read Davey) while screaming “feel the breeze” and, sadly enough, rolling those winnings into a $500 tip when he accidentally left his earnings at a fine establishment at 5 AM (or so my cell phone log reads, I was already counting hetty sleep by that point).

Above: Since The Skidmore Scope (our alumni magazine) has rejected the last few photos I've submitted (apparently they favor babies over Bonnaroo), I'm going to try to get this in the Winter/Spring edition. I'll just leave out the whole hookers in Vegas part...

Above: The anti walk of shame...Suman en route to his wedding. His smile falls somewhere between elated and scared shitless

Above: John (right) was awarded best man duties, which included holding the ring, signing the wedding certificate and making sure Suman didn't end up in the next "Makisupa Policeman" narrative

Above: Nick, Jen, Eric and I at the wedding. Next time the four of us are wedding two of us might be under a hupa (and no this wedding isn't taking place is Massachusetts)

Above: Vegas is full of difficult decisions. Should I...

a) see a concert and visit the shark reef?
b) play poker and attend a comic book convention?
c) eat sushi and watch someone get married?
Since I've already been to a and b, we opted for letter c. The sushi was great and the wedding wasn't bad either! (though it did take us longer to get our order than for Suman and Kristi to tie the knot)

Above: Jen took most of these pictures, except this one of course since she's in it. She'd probably prefer it if I discussed her encounter with Page at the Mandalay Bay rather than commenting on her post-tour teacher glasses, but then again what are friends for?

Above: Since I temporally lost my podcast co-host Benjy on Daft Punk tour this summer, I figured I look for him in the most obvious location. Alas, no luck....

Above: The Bride, the Groom and their Beer